Question Time Again
by Sis21K
Summary: Excitement had been brewing among the newsies of Lower Manhattan all day. That morning, Jack had made the exhilarating announcement that there was to be another Question Time that evening! Jack made the comment to Davey that he didn't understand why they were always so excited. "Half of 'em always end up crying."
1. Getting Ready

**Hello again, fellow fansies! I'm back with the sequel-sort-of-thing to Question Time.**

 **As you'll notice, I've added in some characters who weren't there last time that I think you'll enjoy. Also, I added Mouse, my OC from Silence Speaks. It's not necessary that you read that before this; she's not a big deal here. And if you're groaning "Ugh...why does she have to put her OC in THIS too?! _"_...well, you'll get over it. ;)**

 **Standard disclaimers apply. And sorry if this first chapter seems a little choppy...I don't know, I read it over, but...enjoy!**

Excitement had been brewing among the newsies of Lower Manhattan all day.

That morning, Jack had made the exhilarating announcement that there was to be another Question Time that evening, the name given to a night when the newsies gathered in their Lodging House (in an orderly circle, which was most rare) and asked questions of each other, to be answered truthfully. The newsies were ecstatic at the news, bringing it up throughout the day.

Jack made the comment to Davey that he didn't understand why they were always so excited. "Half of 'em always end up crying." Davey just shrugged; the original idea was his, anyway, so he didn't try to discourage their excitement.

Perhaps the most eager newsie was Les, who told anyone that would listen about it being his sister's first Question Time, a fact which, of course, they all knew.

Mouse was two years older than Les and until very recently, had been mute. She hadn't spoken a word since the age of six; an intense series of events led to her finally being able to speak again, six years later. However, this miracle hadn't come without injury—scars on her back and burns on her hands were still healing. Though she could speak now, she was still quiet most of the time. Still, she was much happier, and seemed almost as excited as Les for the Question Time, which she'd heard about from her brothers but never taken part in.

That evening, after a long day of selling, the newsies marched back to their Lodging House in a roar of conversation. They were ready—and bubbling with excitement.

Jack called them all to order.

"All right, all right! Let's do this! Get in a circle…that's it…pull up a chair…yeah, Crutch, you can sit on the bed with me…move closer, boys, closer! You don't gotta to spread out all over the room! Jeez…all right, just pull it out a little…no, just a little—don't—" There was a crash. "What did I tell you? Pick it up…pick it up, I said! Don't just stand there…ugh…Hey, make room for him…move over, move it…make room for Albert…okay. Everyone ready?"

Their voices died down, shuffling stilled. Jack grinned and plopped down on a lower bunk bed between Crutchie and Davey. In the moment of quiet there came a harsh pounding at the door. Jack froze, his face suddenly pale. "Who's there?" he shouted.

"Lemme in!"

The color returned to Jack's face, and he got to his feet. "Is that who I thinks it is?"

"If you thinks it's Spot Conlon, King o' Brooklyn, then yeah, you'se right!" came the muffled voice. "Now, s'you gonna let me in or am I gonna have to bust down the door?"

Jack flew across the room and threw the door open. Spot Conlon was there in an impressive stance, taking up the whole doorway. He peered in, taking in the circle of newsies. Jack jumped aside as Spot cracked his knuckles and stepped into the Lodging House.

"What do we got here? A cozy little—"

"Whatcha doin' on my turf, huh?" Jack slammed the door. A few newsies's eyes widened, impressed with their leader's nerve.

Spot whipped his head around to glare at Jack. He had been interrupted, which would usually merit a fist to the mouth—if it was your standard newsie mouthing off. However, these were hardly standard conditions. Spot Conlon was facing Jack Kelly in a roomful of Manhattan newsies…and even Spot knew he was just a little out of his league.

So he forced a laugh. "For your information, Kelly, I was tipped off that there was gonna be some kind of meeting here tonight. Seems my information was correct. So whatcha up to, huh? Organizin' another strike?"

"Nah," Jack said, and then, to keep him interested, "Just havin' ourselves a Question Time."

"What's that?" Spot asked suspiciously.

Jack sat down in his place again. "Well, I'd invite you to stay, but it'll probably take all night, so if you got stuff to do…"

"I got plenty of time." Spot clearly didn't like being kept in the dark. "So what is this—'Question Time,' you said? Like I said, looks to me like you'se havin' a—"

"We _ain't_."

"What kinda questions we askin'?"

"Any kind you like. Someone asks, we go around the circle and everyone answers. Thing is, you gotta answer truthfully, otherwise you'se kicked outta the game. That's the only rule." Jack dropped his pretentious manner. "Smart, ain't it? Davey thought of it."

"The Mouth? Figures." Spot frowned. "Don't seem too smart to me."

"Well, pull up a chair and we'll show you how it's done. It's all right if Spot Conlon joins us, _huh_?" he asked his newsies with a bit of a threatening tone. They all nodded quickly. "That's what I thought. All right, boys—and, uh, Mouse—"

"You got a _girl_ here, Kelly?!"

"And we'll get started!"

There was another knock at the door. Everyone groaned. A moment later, Katherine burst in, freezing at the sight of the newsies.

"Oh! Oh, sorry. I hope I'm not interrupting anything…"

"Hey, Plums," Jack said, jumping to his feet and nearly tripping over his own feet in his hurry to get to her. "It's all right, we'se just doing Question Time, how's about you joins us?"

"I was just going to—"

"Great. Romeo, grab her a chair, won't you?"

"Jack, it's okay, I don't have to—"

"Sit. Now."

Katherine sat, looking flustered but rolling her eyes at Jack's enthusiasm. He planted a kiss on her forehead and the rest of the newsies made exaggerated retching noises behind him. Katherine's arrival seemed to defuse the tension created by Spot.

Finally Jack settled himself between Davey and Crutchie again. Davey glanced around the circle to make sure everyone was paying attention. "Okay, we ready? Jack, you wanna start?" There was a pause. " _Jack_."

Jack started. He had been reaching across Crutchie to hold hands with Katherine and not been listening. The couple's clasped hands rested in Crutchie's lap now, and Crutchie rolled his eyes. Katherine looked apologetic. Jack's cheeks were slightly flushed. "Huh? What?"

"You wanna start?"

"Oh. Right. Hold on, I just had one…lemme think…"

There was quiet apprehension in the room while Jack scrunched up his nose in thought.

The silence was suddenly broken by Race, who sounded disgusted.

"All right, you lovers, break it up, I don't think I can stand your hands that close to Crutchie's—"

"OKAY!" squealed Katherine, jerking her hand out of Jack's grip. They resumed holding hands, both looking slightly abashed, behind Crutchie's back.

Crutchie smirked. Spot was slouching, arms crossed impatiently, in his chair. "We gonna start this or what?"

"Right, okay…hmm…oh yeah! Okay, I remembered my question. Everyone know how this goes? We all ready? How about—"

"Just ask the question already!"

"All right! All right! Just making sure…"

 **And now for the fun part-your questions! You can leave a review with a question for the newsies to answer individually! (They may get reworded a little in the writing process, as you know, but that's okay.) I'll try my very best to use as many questions as I can. I don't know whether Jack's question should be light-hearted or really deep...you guys will have to decide.**

 **So review! And ask away!**

 **-Sis21K**


	2. Jack's Question

**My apologies to everyone for the delay in updating! Also for the drama at the end of this chapter...**

 **Just a general reminder that in Question Time I don't give shout-outs to whoever submitted the question of the chapter. If you want to know, as usual, just read through the reviews. I have my reasons for doing this, but also know how much I appreciate all the questions I've been getting! Thank you to everyone who reviewed and gave a question! Obviously I could only use one in this chapter, so don't fret if it's not yours! All the questions were really good and many will be used in future chapters!**

"My question for everyone is…" Jack paused dramatically. Spot glared at him, prompting him to quickly continue, "What's the stupidest thing you've ever done?"

There were a few laughs, but right away everyone sunk into deep thought. Jack gave them a moment to think, then turned to his left. "Crutch? You'se up first."

"All right…stupidest thing I ever did was probably…tryin' to walk without my crutch last summer when I was sick."

"No kidding," Race snorted. "Idiot."

"Hey, I was sick! I musta been sleepwalking or somethin'!" Crutchie protested.

"Don't make it any less stupid."

"Hey, now!" Katherine raised her voice. She paused, and smirking, turned to Crutchie. "I think we need a full story." There were shouts of agreement, even though most of the boys had witnessed the event.

Crutchie groaned. "There wasn't much to it, I mean, I was just sick with…with the flu or somethin'…" He looked at Jack for confirmation. "Yeah, flu…and I was real hot and kinda dizzy so I tried to sleep…next thing you know, I woke up in a heap on the floor! I musta tried to walk in my sleep, but my crutch wasn't there so I just dropped to the floor, being extra weak and all from the fever."

"Why wasn't your crutch beside you?" Katherine asked.

Jack spoke up. "Well, 'cause I took it from him, didn't I? I knew he would want to get out of bed…he was even tryin' to get me to let him go sellin' that morning…" Jack laughed. "I just didn't know he was _that_ out of it!"

"Next person!" Davey called as the newsies busted out in laughter.

"That'd be me," Katherine said, having quickly figured out the game. "The stupidest thing I've ever done was trying to get my father to hire me."

"What?!" Jack spluttered. "When did that happen?"

"After I reviewed some flower shows and wanted some better stories," she said indifferently. "Of course, I should have known he wouldn't like the idea of paying his daughter…he never gave me money when I was little."

"Did you know us when you asked him?"

"No. Well, I shouldn't say that. It was the day I met Jack. He snuck up to my box at Medda's theatre." Jack grinned proudly. "Of course, right after my father turned me away, I got the big story—the strike story—"

"We got our mugs in the papes!" Race bragged to Spot, who swatted him away with a glare.

"—and I was sure glad he didn't hire me then!"

"Albert?" Davey said. "Your turn!"

"Stupidest thing I ever done was getting too close to the Brooklyn bridge."

"Bet my boys didn't let you forget it!" Spot grinned, cracking his knuckles.

"Hey, it ain't like he crossed it," Jack said, suddenly serious. "I'm telling you, Spot, you gotta tell your fellas to lay off of my newsies."

"Why should I? I got the best protection in New York—why should I cut any slack? Huh?"

"'Cause I said you should," Jack said, jumping to his feet. Crutchie and Davey, on either side of him, pulled Jack roughly back down.

"Don't mess with Brooklyn, we won't mess with you," Spot said calmly.

"Okay, next!" Davey said, frowning at Jack.

Henry scrunched up his face in thought. "Uh…oh yeah. This was pretty stupid. I took Race's cigar one morning."

"Take it easy, I do that every morning," Albert said with a grin. Race glared at both of them.

"Spot's next," Jack said.

"Well, I ain't done any really stupid things." Spot shrugged.

"Aw, come on, everyone's done something stupid."

"I thought you were gonna say joining the strike," Jack said.

Spot leaned forward. "Naw, Jack Kelly, joining the strike was the smartest thing I ever did."

Jack looked touched. "You don't say?"

"Sure thing. What was stupid is how long it took for us to join."

"There you go."

"No, I ain't sayin' that's our fault, I'm sayin' you shoulda shown us what you'se made of a long time ago, then we woulda jumped in right away. But before that, Manhattan was kinda a joke 'round Brooklyn."

Half the newsies jumped out of their seats, ready to tackle Spot.

"Let us at him, Jack!" Race shouted.

"Sit down!" Jack roared. "What're you, crazy? Attackin' Spot Conlon right in front of my face?"

"Attacking me at all is pretty stupid," Spot added, not having moved an inch from his slouch.

Jack had to take Race by the shoulders and force him back into his seat, but though there was much grumbling, no one made to attack Spot again.

"What I was saying was, that was pretty stupid, of us not to trust our fellow newsies," Spot said. The muttering stopped. "We don't think you'se a joke anymore."

"You sure don't!" Race said.

"Moving on…Romeo!"

"Oh, lemme guess," Albert said, grinning. "He tried to get some old lady to fancy him and she socked him in the face!" Laughter.

Romeo reddened. "Well…actually, it was sorta like that," he mumbled. A small giggle was heard from Mouse, which set them all off again.

"Quiet! Quiet!" Davey bellowed. He was trying unsuccessfully to hold in a grin. "We gotta get through this! Race! Answer!"

"Stupidest thing I ever done was play cards with this tramp in the deli who promised me ten bucks if I beat him," Race rattled off.

"And?"

"Shoulda known, he hardly had a nickel on him! Shuffled off right after he lost and took two of my dimes, too!"

"Elmer!"

"What?"

"Answer!"

"Oh. Okay, but I said this one last time. Remember? That I tried to sell matches before I came here! That was stupid of me, for sure…"

"What is wrong with you?" Race yelled, looking utterly baffled. "I think the stupidest thing you'se ever done is _tell_ us that—and then he brings it up again, right when most of us had forgotten you even said it!"

"Doesn't matter, doesn't matter," Davey said, rolling his eyes. "Finch?"

"Uh, probably…stupidest thing I ever done was try to fight the Delanceys, one-on-two, in an alley."

"Your eyes were swollen for a week!" Mush laughed.

"Next—Buttons!"

"Hey, hey, slow down!" Spot said, sitting up. "Why you rushing it, Mouth? I wanna hear these stories!"

"Because, I have a kid brother and sister who both need to get to sleep before midnight—"

"So send 'em to bed and we'll keep going without 'em!"

"No way!" Les and Mouse both shouted.

"I'm not doing that, because they wouldn't sleep until Question Time is over." Davey replied calmly. "They'd be eavesdropping and trying to sneak back down…"

"We _would_ ," Mouse said earnestly.

"Last time, I stayed up until the very end," Les boasted.

"I didn't," said Buttons. "And I probably won't again tonight. We still gotta sell tomorrow, I gotta rest up!"

"So we just don't dawdle with the answers so we can finish up in time for Les and Mouse to get to bed. They're the youngest here and they're my responsibility," Davey finished.

"But—"

"Hey, ain't it my turn?" Buttons said. He waited for everyone's attention before continuing. "The stupidest thing I'se ever done was trying to jump off the roof."

"What happened?" Katherine asked.

"Note the word 'trying'. That didn't turn out well," Jack said, yawning.

"Broke my arm and a leg," Buttons said, almost proudly. "Had to use a crutch for a while. Sold more papes than I ever did before!"

"But that's terrible, you could have died!" Katherine exclaimed. "Why'd you do it in the first place?"

"Race dared me to," Buttons said with a shrug.

"Mine is a dare from Race, too!" Mush exclaimed, being next in line. "I jumped into the harbor. In _February_." He looked around impressively.

"And?"

"It was cold."

"Wow, I couldn't have guessed that," Jack said, rolling his eyes.

"Just about froze to death. Race looked scared when I stopped moving," Mush chuckled. Race coughed, frowning. "I just did it to see what he'd do, though. It was easy to swim back. Cold, still, but nothing I couldn't handle." He flexed his arm.

"Specs' turn!"

"One time I ate at that place that closed a few years ago…the dirty shop with the moldy bread and—"

"We know what you'se talking about!" Finch yelled, looking green.

"Well, I ate there, and I was up all night, sick. Stuff came out _both_ ends—"

"Shut up!" Jack shouted at him over the newsies' laughter. Katherine looked disgusted. "We did not need details…"

The laughter died down, and Davey turned to his sister. "Mouse? Your turn."

"What's the stupidest thing you've ever done?" Les prompted.

"I'm not dumb, I heard the question," Mouse snapped. "And…well, it was believing Pulitzer." She looked shyly at Katherine. "When he said he would deliver my letters to Katherine but he was reading them and pretending to write back as Katherine…" she shuddered. "I was an idiot."

"No, you weren't," Katherine said softly. "My father can be very persuasive."

"I still should have known something was up."

"It doesn't matter now," Les said. "It's over."

"I know. At least I can talk now, I don't have to write if I want to tell you something."

Spot looked completely confused, and Davey seemed to want to move it along before the entire story had to be told. "Les."

"Okay, the stupidest thing I've ever done was the same as Finch. Taking on the Delancey brothers."

"Oh, Les!" Katherine gasped.

"Yeah, luckily I saw the kid and got him out before Morris really got down to business…" Jack rolled his eyes. "I wonder about you, kid," he said, reaching across Davey to punch Les in the shoulder.

"Davey's turn," Les said with a grin.

"Well, mine was trying to memorize a dictionary."

Groans were mixed with the laughter. "How did that turn out for you?"

"Well, obviously I failed," Davey said matter-of-factly. "I really thought I could do it, too. Before I got to 'adequate' and realized I was wasting my time."

"Nice. Back to Jack, now?" said Katherine, taking charge. Her voice softened suddenly. "Jack?"

"I…well, it ain't funny, but it's definitely the stupidest…" Jack was abruptly mellow. He seemed to be fighting an inner battle with himself. "We gotta tell the truth, right?"

"It's okay, Jack—"

"I gotta say it," Jack said, staring at his hands. The room got quiet. The newsies held their breath, visibly bracing themselves for a confession from their leader.

"Jack?"

"The stupidest thing I ever done was kill my brother."

The room got, if possible, even more silent.

"What?" Katherine burst out. "Jack, what are you talking about? You never killed anyone."

"All your brothers are right here."

"You talking about one of the boys who left?"

"We'se all you're brothers, you ain't never killed one of your brothers."

"Shut up!" Jack shouted. Katherine looked frightened. "You don't understand! I'm talking about my real brother!"

Silence.

Before anyone could protest, before anyone could say that _they_ were his real brothers, Crutchie gasped. "No!" He alone seemed to suddenly understand what Jack was talking about. "No! Jack, it wasn't your fault!"

"It was and I know it," Jack muttered. "You were only there at the end, Crutchie, you don't know…the stupid things that led up to it…"

"It wasn't your fault!" Crutchie said firmly. "I can't believe you still blame yourself!"

"And wouldn't you?" Jack yelled, jumping to his feet.

"Jack!" Katherine exclaimed. "What's going on?"

The sound of her voice seemed to bring Jack back to reality. "Nothing," he said, sitting down. "It's nothing. I don't want to talk about it." Crutchie looked reproachfully at him, but didn't speak. Jack avoided everyone's eyes. "Well? That's the end of that question. Let's move on to the next one."

The newsies were quiet, but didn't protest. Most of them had come to accept that there would always be things they didn't know about Jack Kelly.

 **Please review and leave questions!**

 **Also, again, sorry about the drama at the end...I will be posting another short story in explanation for Jack's answer.**

 **-Sis21K**


	3. Crutchie's Question

**Oh. My. Gosh. You guys, I have been missing for months. I'm so sorry that I haven't been updating anything. I can't promise it will get too much better, but I'm going to try. I've actually been working more on some original stories lately (maybe I'll post them on FictionPress?), plus with class and work and everything else I've hardly had time to crank out any fanfiction.**

 **So here's this update...better late than never, I guess. Keep the questions coming, and I'll work hard to get this fic started up again!**

The tension gradually began to ease in the room when Crutchie cleared his throat. "Ahem. Well, here's my question."

"Hit it," said Davey.

"If you could give one piece of advice to your past self, what would it be?"

"Deep," commented Spot.

"Yeah, well." Crutchie shrugged, glancing at Katherine, who looked thoughtful.

"Let me think," she said, biting her lip. "Um…I would probably tell myself to be a little nicer to Jack Kelly. Then maybe we would have fallen in love sooner."

"I was in love with you the moment I saw you," Jack said, leaning around Crutchie to kiss Katherine's cheek. Crutchie groaned.

Albert seemed ready with his answer right away. "I could have given myself a lot of advice over the years; selling, you know. 'Don't try with that lady, she'll smack you with her purse.' 'Quick, hit up that couple before Specs does!' 'You idiot, that ain't your turf! You're gonna get your butt kicked!' All that."

The newsies were snickering. Spot cracked a grin. "I seem to remember the time you coulda used that last bit o' advice. Following that lady onto the bridge wasn't your best move."

"I was twelve, okay?!"

"And you learned your lesson." Spot cracked his knuckles. "Black and blue for a week, huh? That's what Jack said."

"Jack yelled at you," Albert recalled with relish. "He said you shouldn't've set your fellas on me."

"Well, you learned your lesson, didn't you? Sometimes ole Spot is the best of teachers."

"That's enough!" Jack commanded, rubbing his head. "Don't remind me of that day. We thought you'se was dead when we found you, all bloody and bruised…"

"Next!" Davey said.

Henry snorted. "I'm surprised no one's talked about the strike yet," he said. "Coulda used lots o' advice during that."

"Sure coulda," Spot agreed, cutting him off. Jack narrowed his eyes, but Spot quickly added, "Like, 'get Brooklyn's butts over here!' You know, if you coulda persuaded us sooner, you all would've won that strike a whole lot quicker."

"Ain't our fault you didn't think we'd go through with it."

"You hadn't exactly proved yourselves trustworthy," Spot pointed out.

"Henry?" Davey asked. "Anything else? You sort of got interrupted."

"Nah. That's all."

"Okay, Spot had his turn, so now we're at Romeo."

"While we'se on the topic of the strike, let's start with when I was all bloodied up after we got hit by the bulls and stuff. Why the heck didn't I milk it for all it was worth?" Laughs erupted, but Romeo maintained a straight face. "Seriously? We all know girls go for the tough-looking guys. Well, what looks tougher than a beat-up kid? I could've said stuff about the strike, the girls would've fallen head over heels! What was I thinking, tap dancing on the tables at Jacobi's?"

"You was tap dancing?" Spot snickered.

"Without me?!" Jack demanded.

It took quite a while to calm Jack down, when any amount of explaining and reassuring still left him feeling insulted that they'd been having a fun time without him. "You was in an awful mood, Jack," Davey insisted. "You rushed right off and didn't want to be disturbed!"

"I can't believe you Manhattan guys," Spot guffawed. "It's like your whole lives is a musical!"

"What's a musical?" Les asked innocently.

"Like what plays in Medda's theatre, nitwit. Like Shakespeare, you know. But with singing."

"Sounds ridiculous," Les muttered.

"I see Davey's been teaching you big boy words," Spot said.

"That's enough—enough! We gotta move this thing along!" Davey yelled. Eventually, all conversation died down, and they kept it moving.

Elmer was next. "My advice to my past self would be not to sell matches."

"Hear hear!" half the newsies shouted, then erupted into laughter.

Finch took his turn almost immediately. "Mine would be to come here, to the Lodging House, sooner."

"Good one," said Davey, seeming more cheerful now that things were moving faster. "Buttons?"

"I dunno. Can I go to bed?"

"You were the first one in bed last time!"

"No I wasn't!"

"We've hardly done two questions yet!" Jack said.

"Fine. My advice to my past self would be to go to bed earlier last night."

Davey rolled his eyes. "Whatever. Keep going, guys."

"I don't really know, either," Mush murmured. "I guess, I wish I would have run more every day, so maybe I would've had a better chance when it came time to fight the bulls. Maybe I could've helped some of you guys instead of just saving my own butt."

The newsies were quiet—except for Spot, who burped loudly. "Well, aren't you all a sorry bunch. Get over yourselves, won't you? You won the freaking strike, didn't you?"

"Yeah," Jack said, "Come on, newsies. Heads up. Pull yourselves together."

"Let's keep going." Davey shifted in his seat. "Specs?"

"Hmm…maybe I would give myself a bit o' advice."

"That's kind of the point."

"I know, shut up! No, I meant advice about selling. Standing up to the stupid Delanceys. Stuff like that."

"All right," said Jack. "Mouse?"

Mouse smiled slightly. The newsies hushed, knowing how quiet her voice was.

"I would tell myself, 'don't go back to the factory. You're going to start it on fire.'"

When the newsies just looked at her sadly, she rolled her eyes. Finally, they realized she was trying to make a joke. The terrible burns she had received hadn't been a joke at the time, but her ability to joke about the accident now gave them all hope. They laughed appreciatively.

When the laughter died down, Les took his turn without being prompted. "I would tell myself to stay strong and happy, even when everything seemed hopeless." There was a pause, in which everyone drank in his words. "That's all," he added quietly.

"Good," said Jack. "You can't put it much better than that. Davey?"

"Well," Davey started, "I would try to convince myself that being a newsie was a good idea faster than I did. And I would tell myself to be more open-minded when we met you. Considering, of course, that my past self didn't freak out upon seeing an apparition of myself in the future, because personally, I'm pretty sure I would think I was going insane. Also, there are theories that the past can't be changed. Although with all things put into perspective, I would probably come to the conclusion that—"

"Stop!" Jack yelled, moaning, with his hands over his ears. "You're giving me a headache with all that smart stuff."

"Just doing my job," said Davey with a smirk.

Jack shook his head, as though shaking water from his hair. "You scare me sometimes…anyway. I would tell my past self not to sulk after we got beat, but to go with you to Jacobi's so that I would be included on the party!" He crossed his arms.

Everyone started speaking at once. "It wasn't a party, Jack!" Davey yelled over the noise.

After a minute, they calmed down enough to hear Jack's real answer. "I would tell myself to spend more time thinking about the here and now—what's happening now."

"Good one," said Crutchie, after a pause. "All right, we'se back to me. I would tell my past self to be stronger, not to act like such a coward."

"You ain't a coward!" Jack said fiercely. "You'se the bravest—"

"Shut up, Jack, it's my answer, okay?" Crutchie sounded weary. Jack was surprised at his tone, but let it drop.

Spot yawned. "Ugh, how can you'se be so sulky all the time, newsies?" No one answered. The silence dragged on. Spot was in the middle of another yawn when a soft voice made him jump.

"I dunno if you noticed, but it's kind of a tough life out there."

Spot's eyes darted around, finally resting on Mouse, who was staring defiantly at him.

"Was that the girl, Kelly?" His voice was sharp. "Did the little girl just use that tone with me?"

"It's late, we're all tired," Mouse continued quietly. "This is the time when we can finally be honest with ourselves. And no one asked you to come."

You could have heard a pin drop.

The tension rose with each passing second of silence. Mouse never dropped her gaze. And Spot knew he had been beat.

He started clapping.

The newsies joined him quickly. Soon the applause for Mouse was thunderous. There were laughs, hoots, and hollers. And the sad atmosphere changed considerably. It was Question Time—hadn't they looked forward to it all day?

 **Thank you for reading and sticking with me even when I go missing sometimes. Please review!**

 **-Sis21K**


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